Major depression is a prevalent and harmful illness in the United States. About 7% of Americans experience depressive symptoms each year. Leaving depression untreated can result in poor general health and increased susceptibility to severe health risks such as suicide. Although there exists a variety of effective treatment methods for depression, the National Health and Nutrition Survey 2005-2006 reports that less than 30% of depressed individuals will be seen by a mental health care professional. It is essential that current efforts work toward encouraging depressed persons to seek treatment. A number of health promotion campaigns for mental health have tried reaching depressed individuals with little success. Created through a series of projects conducted with depressed men and women, Faces of Depression is a messaging strategy campaign that may prove highly effective with this audience. The campaign utilized video and computer program media in health clinic waiting areas to encourage patients with depressive symptoms to seek help from a primary care physician. These forms of media often capture attention; however, they also require many resources that may not be readily available at a health clinic. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether a cost-sensitive poster version of the Faces of Depression campaign would be an effective alternative to the original media. Undergraduate students completed an online survey concerning their willingness to discuss depression with a physician and their reactions to the health poster. Some had previously sought help from a mental health professional (33%), yet few had received treatment for depression (11%). However, 48% of the participants met the criteria for having current depressive symptoms. Although scores for the posters’ visual elements were low, the idea of the poster in a health clinic waiting area was well received by those currently depressed and non-depressed. Moreover, non-depressed persons were likely to indicate that they would seek help in response to the poster if experiencing depressive symptoms. The study is limited by poster design elements. Amendments to these aesthetic details would likely increase poster effectiveness. Future research should ensure that health promotion materials target those currently experiencing symptoms, especially men. / text

In Massachusetts and around the country, public secondary schools have designed support groups and other programs to improve gay, lesbian, bisexual, and questioning (GLBQ) students' sense of safety at school. There is a tacit understanding that public middle and high schools are homophobic, unsafe places for students based on a belief that the majority is homophobic or un-accepting of their GLBQ peers. This study investigated the criteria GLBQ high school students use to define their sense of safety at school, surveyed five student bodies about their attitudes toward GLBQ students and explored correlations between students' personal feelings of comfort and their perceptions of others' comfort. Generally speaking, students were, "Sort of comfortable" to "Very comfortable" with sexual minorities and would support a friend who came out as GLB. All students, regardless of self-identified sexual orientation, underestimated peer support for gays, lesbians and bisexuals. The most supportive students tended to be older, female, have higher grade point averages, value education beyond high school and experience support from an adult in their school, community or both.

The intent of this thesis is to explore the relationship between social media use and mental health in the young adult population. Current research indicates that there is a connection between increased social media use and deteriorated mental health. Unfortunately, young adults, the most active social media users, have a predominantly high risk for developing mental health issues, making this connection particularly concerning. At present, it is unclear how social media and mental health are connected; therefore this thesis explores the individual and social theories that may give reason for this connection. Theories that are discussed include: the impact of sedentary behaviors on mental health, displaced behavior, sleep interruption due to blue light exposure, social media's effects on romantic relationships, and social media's effects on platonic relationships.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Canterbury, 2007. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (p. 254-277). Also available via the World Wide Web.

The authoress of the diploma thesis aims to determine if it is possible for the public to learn serious information by means of media, i.e. information related to the prevention of health problems, and to monitor the state of medialisation of these problems by setting partial targets. The objective of the diploma thesis is to discover if media address such topics which should be medialised, in the view of statistically most frequent causes of death and the perspective of prevention and protection of the public health. The nature of significant health problems and the prevention of what topics should appear in daily newspapers have been determined in accordance with epidemiologic data and frequency of diseases which have been the most common causes of death in the Czech Republic in the long term, and which are summarized, inter alia, in mortality tables of the Czech Statistical Office. Another partial objective is to establish what types of themes appear most frequently, to determine the differences between the online and printed forms of media, and to discover who the authors engaging in these problems are. Two dailies were selected for our research - MfDnes (with its regional supplement Jižní Čechy) and the regional Českobudějovický deník in the printed form, including their supplements, including some of their thematic web pages. The research has also examined three independent magazines.The present diploma thesis is divided into a theoretical part and a research part. The theoretical part summarizes - based on the study of available literature and secondary data analysis - basic information regarding the problems of health and illness, prevention, media, the most common causes of death in the Czech Republic, briefly characterizing individual diseases and risk factors of their origin, as being familiar with such facts is essential for their prevention.The research part approaches the collection and evaluation of data in a combined manner. First, data were collected and studied by analysing documents. Afterwards, data were evaluated by means of qualitative statistics, whereas the methods of so-called descriptive statistics were utilized. The quantitative content analysis - which is usually used for the research into mass media - was used for analysing articles. The acquired data were tested statistically by bivariate analysis method. Copies of dailies and their magazines from 2010 were found in the Research Library of South Bohemia. News servers and thematic web pages were browsed by means of media archive.Individual objectives of the diploma thesis have been met. The reached conclusion stipulates that on the one hand, media do address the prevention of significant health problems; on the other hand, they fail to interconnect it with concrete diseases to an adequate extent. The medialisation of topics related to neoplasms is insufficient. Moreover, the thesis has discovered that the most common themes that media engage in are related to the problems of nutrition/overweight and slimming, both in the online and printed forms of all media analysed. It has been determined that the representation of article topics differ for individual media analysed. The most frequent authors of such articles are women. In most cases, there are most often two or three authors who participate in the medialisation of prevention of health problems. In the authoress?s view, the present diploma thesis may provide feedback to authors who examine issues of the prevention of health problems. In addition, with its illustrative overview of the most common causes of death in the Czech Republic, the thesis might highlight the necessity of medialisation of prevention of some themes; and, contrariwise, it could pinpoint less important, but frequently medialised themes, which take up too much space in both printed and online media.

p. 1-79 / Submitted by Santiago Fabio (fabio.ssantiago@hotmail.com) on 2013-04-23T20:15:51Z No. of bitstreams: 1 22222.pdf: 419886 bytes, checksum: 5c70118bbaea75146385b7ce99ffed2b (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Creuza Silva(mariakreuza@yahoo.com.br) on 2013-05-04T17:31:56Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 22222.pdf: 419886 bytes, checksum: 5c70118bbaea75146385b7ce99ffed2b (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2013-05-04T17:31:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 22222.pdf: 419886 bytes, checksum: 5c70118bbaea75146385b7ce99ffed2b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009 / A influência da publicidade de alimentos nos padrões de saúde da população e suas formas de controle pela sociedade é um assunto controverso, uma vez que representa uma arena potencial de embates políticos e ideológicos, aonde o tema saúde se confronta diretamente com os interesses de mercado. Visando identificar os conflitos existentes em relação ao assunto, este estudo analisou as matérias jornalísticas que trataram do controle da publicidade de alimentos no país. Para tanto, foram identificados e submetidos a uma análise de conteúdo em jornais de circulação nacional os artigos publicados entre 2006 e 2008 que abordaram o assunto. A avaliação de 42 matérias jornalísticas demonstrou que a discussão do assunto envolve diversos atores do setor público, da sociedade civil organizada e do setor privado, e que o debate no período estudado centrava-se na proposta da Agência Nacional de Vigilância Sanitária de regulamentação da publicidade de alimentos com quantidades elevadas de açúcar, de sódio, de gordura saturada, trans e de bebidas de baixo teor nutricional. A auto-regulamentação exercida pelo Conselho Nacional de Auto-regulamentação Publicitária (CONAR) também esteve presente, mas, sempre como uma forma alternativa de controle às iniciativas do Estado. O principal argumento favorável ao controle estatal esteve relacionado ao controle das doenças crônicas não transmissíveis no país. O repertório para refutar o controle do Estado foi mais amplo, envolvendo aspectos relacionados à saúde, à economia, ao Direito e à Política, e apresenta-se permeado pelo discurso neoliberal. / Salvador